Abortion Protests: Missing the Point

We are talking about human lives and when those lives can be snuffed out to meet the desires of others.

And yet I've never been shown any evidence that women have "late-term abortions" on a whim or because they decide that they just can't handle a kid after all.

I'll agree that the issue gets murkier the later the woman waits, I just don't believe that women have abortions at later stages for the same reason that they have them 4 or 5 days after having unprotected sex.

Thanks Aaron, for this article. It's very well written and takes both sides into account- had you not stated you consider yourself pro-choice, I wouldn't of had a clue what side you were on.

Once again, incredible job :thumbsup:

Question #1 is a scientific one. The clump of cells a couple of days after fertilization is not a human, so it has none of the rights we grant to humans. However, when it is two months from being due, the baby is a human and should be treated as such. The difficulty comes from figuring out when that transition point occurs. Setting aside the religious answer of "When the sperm meets the egg," we're left with something best answered by scientific study.

Actually, the question of "when is it a human" is incorrect, I believe. That dips into the question of "humanhood" and what defines a person. The most common answer to this is consciousness, but this is a philosophical argument. Instead, the scientific question is when it becomes an organism, by displaying the biological signs of life. All signs I've seen point to this happening around month three, which is why I oppose post-third-trimester abortions. Simplifying it to "when is it a human" dips into unanswerable philosophical questions, rather than answerable scientific ones.

By the way, I was just kidding you in the other thread, but thanks for the thought. ;-)

No where else but in the US is abortion such a heated controversy. I have to attribute it to the religious root of this country. Everywhere else, abortion is treated as a private decision, left to be made by the pregnant woman, with input from her mate and maybe other family members. Which says, those people trust their fellow citizens with making REASONABLE decisions about important things that affect their lives. PERIOD.

Now, in the US, we have all sorts of religious fanatics (and their less brainy followers) who have nothing else better to do, but worry about women running around getting pregnant then getting abortion, just to get a kick out of it. The same way they worry if gay couples get married, or if some performer shows her breast, all hell will break loose. Which says, these people don't respect and trust others to live ltheir own life they way they want. These people somehow feel this great urge to regulate how others live, and what better way to live than the way only they see fit/moral/religious/what have you!

Well abortion is not an issue to be trivialized, I just don't see why it should be at the top of any nation's priority list. (Same goes for gay marriage, etc.) Why don't we all put our energy and money into things that are more pressing, such as raising the living standard of poor kids (who by the way are already ALIVE and suffering)??? How about giving them better health care? better education? better chance to succeed in life? How about that???

For the life of me, I can't understand why people care SOOOOOO much about unborn children, and NOT give a d$%n about so many underprivileged children living in poverty and hopelessness. If that's not hypocrisy, what is?!

The banner the young woman was holding up read: "If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a holy sacrament."

This actually isn't as simplistic as you might think. I wouldn't go so far as to say it would be a "holy sacrament", but I also do believe that if the situation was reversed, there would not be such a stigma about it. You would have to look a bit into feminist theory for the answer though. Does it fit well into a bumper sticker or a sign? No. But there is a reason behind it.

In short, it stems from the arguments that abortion should be illegal so the pregnancy is a "punishment" for women that don't follow the status quo of the "chaste" woman. You reap what you sow. Yes, this argument stems right out of the 1950s, but we still see variations of it today. Women are still expected to be the guardians of morality, by their own strictly moral nature, while sexually explorative boys will be... you know... boys.

Abortions usually happen for a reason. Whether this be because the woman feels unprepared mentally, if she feels it is not affordable, etc, they are for a reason. The notion that all women should be denied the option says something about the morality of women. Apparently, women are too irresponsible to make these decisions for themselves, and the government must make the decision for them. If it were men, we would not see abortion in this light. The men would make the rational decision. Women are not afforded this same benefit of the doubt, if it is left up to women, they would get them on a whim, like buying shoes.

This is offensive to those of a feminist mindset. We believe that women are able to make well thought out, weighted decisions. We give them the benefit of the doubt.

There was recently a gentlemen on a different thread on Newsvine regarding abortion who, although he threw a few comments regarding "life" in for a simple measure, his main goal was of this mentality. He punctuated his argument by statements regarding not having sex unless it is solely for the purpose of procreations, he also stressed the irresponsibility aspect of abortion. He also specifically stated that "deterrent" of sexual activity for enjoyment should be a reason for making abortion illegal. He found those that got abortions to be "morally reprehensible", but his reasoning for doing so seemed to lie more in the way the zygote was brought into existence moreso than the act of abortion in of itself.

It is arguments in the nature of this mentality that causes a statement such as the one the young woman was making.

It has a little less to do with a "Men from Mars, Women from Venus" mentality than an attempt to raise awareness about institutionalized patriarchal forms of control. I would ask that you look into feminism 101 before passing judgment on it.

Abortion is about rights: a woman's right to control over her body, a baby's right to live. What makes it all so caustic is that the two rights directly conflict. In essence, the mother is saying, "My right to choice trumps another human's right to life." Of course, the Pro-Choice set won't state it that way because it sounds cold. But that's what's going on.

Not really. It's more an issue of the notion that we cannot dictate what makes a person, it is left up to belief, and if you state the belief that it starts at conception, do you have a right to force that belief on another?

a woman's right to control over her body, a baby's right to live.

You are obviously framing the debate here. There are many that don't consider a zygote as a "baby".

But how is this different from a late-term abortion?

Do you really think that a woman would carry a fetus to term and abort it at the last second, just because she does not want to be a mother? That women feed off of this bloodlust? Of course not. All of the penalties for being pregnant (stigma if it's a single mother, education, wage loss) are passed at this point. There is something else going on here. This usually is the health of the mother, or the unhealthy status of the fetus.

If we are to make progress in this divisive issue, we need to set aside gender politics.

I disagree. Abortion is a debate that is rooted in gender politics. The people that get abortions are women. It is no coincidence that the states that have the least amount of female representatives in congress (Mississippi, South Dakota) are the ones that are the strictest on abortion limits.

Pro-life isn't about life, it's about birth. These pro-birth people don't give a damn what will happen to the kid once it's born, just as long as it's born. I'm with silk (few posts up) here, concentrate on improving the education of those children who are already born first, and once every single one can go to a good school and have a fair and equal chance to develop into an educated civilian, then you can go and start fighting about what should or shouldn't happen to unborns that could be aborted.

I'm always tempted to say "get over yourself" when confronted by accusations of "gender politics" ... even if there is truth to what I consider a distorted self-martyring viewpoint, how helpful is that? To say this is about women's rights is chauvanistic and ... as Aaron said ... missing the point. It's irrelevant whining even if you beleive it. All the peripheral bumper-sticker philosophy gets away from productive discussion, such as one central philosophical issue followed by the ethical/political ones:

The central issue? The definition of human.

If it is a genetic definition, i.e. homo spaiens, the fertilized egg is human. Human baby, human adult, human fetus, it's all the same. "It doesn't have limbs yet" is irrelevant, as per any quadriplegic will tell you. "There's no heartbeat" applies to people with an artificial heart as well. "Cannot survive on it's own" applies to most of us, not just metaphorically, but leave a newborn alone for a few days and see what happens -- and think of the days before forumula. (I could have sworn babies needed something from their moms that I can't quite put my figer on ...)

By this definition, birth (or particular trimester) are not benchmarks.

If by human we mean SENTIENT homo sapiens(i.e. a PERSON), and see that our rights are at least in some cases dependent upon sentience, then things are quite ... muddled. Children arte not sentient as adults are. Infants are certainly not more sentient than average housepets. And retarded children may never be sentient, as are those who become brain damaged or extremely senile.

So by this definition, too, birth (or particular trimester) are not benchmarks, but in the opposite manner. That is perhaps why children do not have the same rights politically as adults, and in ancient Rome, a parent could kill a child up to a certain age with no legal consequence.

Of course the idea of POTENTIAL throws a wrench into the works, and if being a person is defined by potential, then every homo sapien is sacred (pardon the expression if you are secular), regadless of development. Then, as Aaron so aptly and clearly said, it is a matter of conflicting rights. Potenial versus actual -- apples to oranges, perhaps.

But the conflict of rights AFTER the definitions are settled (which they may never be) is the basis for determining how to handle case-by-case situations. Does convenience outweigh the rights based on the defintions? Does the life of the mother if in danger? Do the rights alter if the unborn child is -- or is expected to be -- deformed? Retarded? Short-lived?

So when you make this a "woman issue" you are making it a moral one based on all kinds of assumptions we will not agree on, including judging the woman ten ways to hell and heaven depending on viewpoint. I'm tired of the emotional ploys, gender grudges, and personal attacks.

Thanks Aaron, for bringing some sane thinking to the issue.

A bit of logic and reason can go a long way in an argument flooded with skewed statistics, tainted viewpoints influenced by an unrelated like or dislike of Christianity, and general intolerance for a differing opinion.

So let's step out of that tired debate and study for a moment the Golden Eagle. This bird of prey that nests throughout North America has been a federally protected species since 1963. The current law of the land says that it is illegal to kill, sell, or buy any part of a Golden Eagle. You cannot take down a nest if it is on your property, or even move it. You cannot fry up their eggs for breakfast.

The point is that the US government, and most of non-sheep-herding America, thinks that the life of a Golden Eagle is important enough to get serious about. Whether for their prominent place in the food-chain or their picturesque profile, it is an idea that I'm sure most of us agree with.

Human life is not on the verge of extinction, and is actually all too common nowadays. So common that there is little delay in sending young men to foreign lands to fight for an obscure geopolitical advantage. So common that the broken lives we see under bridges are little more than nuisance when stopped at an underpass. Human life is so widespread that while you can't even move an eagle's egg from its nest (on your property even), the human fetus is easy enough to discard if one decides to.

The reasons for and against the right to abortion are, as I said earlier, tired. I don't understand how a country that will put the potential life of even a bird, even a rara avis, can be protected more than that of a potential human. The message this sends is that a fertilized eagle egg is of greater importance to America than a potential human life.

Now in fact it might be more logical for some minds to have a thriving eagle population than to suffer through overcrowded streets for the rest of our lives. I don't think I can come up with a very good reply to that though. I mean, hell, who wants to go through the hassle of perpetual road construction?

The eagle situation is irrelevant. What makes the dividing line is what is killing the eagle. If an eagle pecks and destroys its own egg, will it be tried for murder? Certainly not, its an eagle. It must have decided that something was wrong and destroyed the egg. But it is illegal for a human to kill an eagle, because a human doesn't have the right to take the eagle's life. Now, I don't see many other species trying specifically trying to kill a human fetus, and if an animal, endangered or not, were to kill a pregnant woman, that is a different story, I guess. But there is no comparison in the manner of which you speak.

I would be much happier, if before America invaded Iraq, we had an argument/debate as heated as the issue of abortion always raises. We (I mean human beings, all of us) can be so self-righteous sometimes, we don't see our own follies. If we really value life so very much, how come we didn't blink once before we started a war that we knew would kill thousands and displace far more?

Rarty was right about one thing - the whole debate on abortion right is a tired one. I've been trying to point out that such a private, rather philosophical matter should be left to private citizen to make. PERIOD.

But no, we can't do that, of course not. You know why? because, at least some of us, have the urge to feel morally superior. We need to maintain the right to tell others what is right and what is wrong, what they can and can not do. Then, we can somehow feel an inner satisfaction knowing that we are not entirely selfish, or that we believe in something that is more important than our own insignificant life.

A fetus is not a citizen. It does not have rights.

Does anyone think there'll be abortions if all children born were guaranteed, feeding, care and schooling till adulthood?

I think there will be, but very very few. The people who don't want abortions should also push to create a safety web for children born in unfortunate circumstances.

Texas is trying to do this with their Baby Moses program. Where they are not doing enough is by NOT also working off the disruptive effects of a pregnancy on a teenager's psyche.

I am pro-choice but I also see that the decision to have an abortion is a VERY brave decision, except for the coldest hearted people, who would simply drown their babies after having them anyway.

I also am pro-life because I think even fetuses deserve to live. The question is how do we resolve the conflict between a woman's right to control over her body, and life, and society's desire for all life to be realised. This is the way I see it, and I always come down on the right of the woman. It's her body, her life, unfortunately. Unfortunately because I share the sentiment that all life should be realised.

The state has no right for children to be born. Society has no such right either. But the woman's right to control over her body and life, and her reproductive health is a hard right.

Do children have a right to be born? Em....I'll say no. No rights without citizenship, eh? The right to life is a universal human right though. The question is when do rights get recognised? Today it's only at birth. That's why we get our citizenships at birth.

With me, abortion is a very hard subject to debate. I consider myself pro-life, but feel is hypocritical to bash those who are pro-choice. I am not a woman, will never be a woman, thus never understand the physical changes or thought processes of dealing with the burden of bringing life into the world through my own body. I feel that pregnancy is completely avoidable and that a woman chooses to have sex (most of the time) and ultimately knows the possible consequences. I just won't tell someone what to do in a situation I will never find myself in because it is irrationally hypocritical in my mind. I won't agree with someone on it, but it is wrong for me to stop them from it as well. Having a baby requires that both partners be responsible for the action, not just the woman. I sometimes find it unfair that the woman has total control int he situation, but understand why this is the case. It took two people to make it, supposed to take two people to raise it, but only one to kill it... unbalanced in some cases, but again I understand it.

Now, I've been up and down every side of adoption there is. I'm adopted, my siblings are adopted, my first born son...was given up for adoption and when I was younger my parents tried to adopt a another baby whose mother changed her mind 6 months after the baby was born. So, yeah... I've been up and down that block... and while it is an alternative to abortion it is very hard to choose to do, I did that 5 years ago and its in my mind daily. I wont make up stories about how easy it is. In my life, I feel I have endured a lot. Been in armed conflict, buried fellow soldiers, watched my grandmother slowly die from cancer, buried two of my best friends hit by a drunk drivers, and antoehr friend die from a drug overdose... and all of that combined was nothing compared having to look at myself in the mirror one day and say " I am incapable of taking care of an innocent life" and follow through with the choice to give him up for adoption.

I don't think abortion should be illegal, nor shunned. I do believe it should be used sparingly. It seems that a lot of younger girls / women use it as a form of convenience...or maybe that is some imposed media stereotype - either way it just seems this way to me. Not so much these days, but when I was in high school I would hear girls talk about it like it was just as normal as answering the phone or taking a shower.

@Oluseye Bassir

Do children have a right to be born? Em....I'll say no. No rights without citizenship, eh? The right to life is a universal human right though. The question is when do rights get recognised? Today it's only at birth. That's why we get our citizenships at birth.

Now here I somewhat agree, however I think receiving rights at birth comes more from the solidification of a child's name. You can't grant something to someone with no name. This raises "well name the baby before he / she is born and then grant rights". That's fine, but do you charge a mother who lives with a smoker with child neglect or some form of negligent behavior? What if hte mother smokes herself? It would open a much larger can of worms in regards to rights and so on. I don't think there are solid answers, just responses in the form of a question.

I just thought of a potential reason some women insist this is a gender issue. I'm not saying I'm pro-choice or pro-life or pro-golf for Pete's sake, and I'm not trying to assert a stereotype. But here's one theory.

Some women assume it only affects them based on it not being an independent being (by whatever definition ... bear with me on this one). But here's the kicker ...

Perhaps some women WANT to beleive it is not a child because if they concede that the unborn is more than tissue they own, the FATHER will have rights. And that can be very threatening if it's a bad relationship, or there isn't a relationship at all.

So for some, maybe this isn't just about human rights or women's rights, but also about father's rights. So when a man speaks for or against legalizing abortion, one cannot assume men have no place for their views unless we agree a man has no right to what may or may not be his own flesh and blood.

But here I go, opening a whole other can of worms ... :^P

Sam: I agree with you on your viewpoint involving birth as a barrier between fetus and human.

I think that perhaps where the division became foggy for some people was maybe the cause of technology. Years and years ago, people couldn't "see" the child before it came out of the woman's stomach, and so it wasn't really alive. But now, we can look at potential life in a little television screen and know that it is something that takes time, and perhaps has life before it comes out of the womb. However, I think that that would be too difficult to determine, the exact time where a fetus is "alive". So birth must be the barrier.

Ken: I'm not sure I understand what you mean when you talk about the father having rights if there is a bad relationship or none at all.... Do you mean that if a fetus is recognized as human, the father would then have rights over the woman's body that weren't there before? I think for most women, it is a question of whether the government as an objective body can say whether or not the woman should have a child, possibly against the woman's will. I think the reason why men don't really have many rights involving the fetus right now stems from the fact that it's not yet provable whether the child is actually theirs, so they may or not have rights. After birth, however, a blood test can determine the father of the child.

When all is said and done Abortion is a personal choice.

The right to an opinion does not equate to the right to force your opinion on another. For this reason abortion and ALL moral questions should NEVER be in the hands of law makers and legislators, because as we all know they simply are following their interest groups etc and rarely does a party politic allow for true and open conscience voting.

JJ

Okay, so one more comment won't hurt, right?

I'm personally mostly pro-life, but politically pro-choice. My personal belief stems from my belief in a human soul (similar to how Christians conceive of it, and yes, the U.S. is a vastly and devoutly Christian nation). I also know that there are ethical dilemmas where, in very special circumstances, one person may need to die to produce the better end result (even if it is grim). We institute a death penalty if an individual is a total sociopath. Pre-Colombian Eskimos would kill their children if they weren't able to contribute to the tribe and the tribe didn't have enough food for everyone. Murder for the life of the people. The same sort of logic goes for "murder for the life of the mother." There are other less black-and-white issues that may arise, such as: what sort of a world is the baby going to be raised in? An abusive family, an unloving mother, etc.? Mothers who have abortions because it is inconvenient are certainly unethical. They will get flak from their parents and her social life as a highschooler will be in serious jeopardy. But to kill a human for those inconveniences is wrong. Is it always wrong to kill an innocent human? No, but it better be extremely rare (the Eskimo example).

Enter the need to have a clear definition of when a fetus is human. You know my belief, but let's face it - it is a belief and not a verifiable fact. That is when the question of physiology comes into play. We know the day when a kid becomes an adult: puberty. There are hormones and sex-organ development. Females ovulate and males can ejaculate. We know when a sac of living tissue becomes an animal: brain activity. To call this baby anything but human is absurd - what is it, a proto-human with a learning capability but no ultimate "humanness" (whatever that truly means)? Do we have another sort of animal out there that we need a new classification for? Our taxonomy of species is quite clear: animals that have this sort of genetic make-up are humans; animals that have something else are bats, etc. Oh, and I know some folks will say that a coma victim with no brain activity but sustained life is still a human. I believe they are more like a vegetable. They died when they lost brain activity for a significant amout of time and are on life support because they once were human and are still alive. It's tough to let go, and their mourners can keep them on life support if it makes them feel better.

But none of those reasons are why Pro-choice is the ultimate answer. Let's think of it in terms of policy. Pro-choicers have it right because abortion is going to happen whether or not it is legal. When it is legal, there are many cost-effective and healthy ways of getting abortions. When it is illegal, one must find a doctor that doesn't mind breaking the law and operate in a clandestine back-room facility for a much more costly (and probably much more gruesome) procedure. Pro-lifers holding signs showing aborted babies should be countered with pro-choicers holding signs showing the damage to the mothers that had illegal abortions.

I wanted to comment about Silk's postings ("Why is it that there are so many poor children all around the world, malnourished and suffering, and no one really gives anything for them? It seems like after they are born, it's not really our issue if they are starving, or poor, or unable to receive good education, because at least they are alive. That is how the United States seems to view its children.") First of all, the U.S. gives the most amount of charity money than the next five contributing nations. Second, it is a matter of logistics why poor children around the world don't get the care they (morally) deserve. Distribution is very costly, even if corn is cheap. Sometimes to avoid that, we donate to countries, but those countries are in such poverty that the police/government often takes most of it for themselves. Management programs to make sure there is no theft are costly. These reasons don't even take into account the controversial issue that welfare programs "give a fish to the person rather than teaches him how to fish." A dependency develops, and rather than national improvement, we have a nation of dependents that rely upon U.S. money and food. Helping a nation means assisting them in economic and institutional reforms, not giving them welfare and hoping they somehow get out of it. (Of course, I'm not so hard-hearted as to say relief to these nations is bad - I think the charities are very necessary and I believe that Americans give a good amount for very noble causes. My point, though, is that this system is a band-aid, not a remedy.)